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Lisa Burlee

Welcome to our refreshed digital home! Alison and I felt the need to redecorate and enliven The Gracious Posse’s look and feel for 2017, and we started here. What do you think so far? Our re-boot list is lengthy, so look for more improvements in the weeks and months to come.

Do you need a digital cleanse, too? Because we spend more and more time on our phones, tablets, laptops and desktops, taking the time to protect and refresh those devices for the coming year makes as much sense as doing a nutritional cleanse or a whole-house deep clean and de-clutter.

Oodles of sites offer recommendations from items as simple as wiping down your screens and keyboards to de-fragging and reformatting your hard drives – yikes! Unless you have the confidence and experience of our technical guru Lisa Burlee, or employ her to help with the heavy lifting, we recommend the following 5 simple, achievable steps.

Before you start, set aside an appropriate amount of time for each task. Perhaps you want to tackle the tasks in 30-minute blocks, like Alison wrote about here.Maybe you set aside an entire day for the cleanse if you have that luxury. Either way, identify a reward for yourself and follow-through with it. Will you get a manicure? Buy yourself flowers? See a movie? Go to lunch? How about new shoes or a purse? What about curling up with your favorite book, guilt-free? See, isn’t this fun already?

Ok, it’s time for your digital cleanse:

1. Backup!

If you don’t already have a back-up for your devices, get one now. Lisa preaches backing-up so much she signs Keep Backing Up at the end of her monthly newsletters. Read her post here for instructions.

2. Apply Updates

Apply all free updates to your devices. Don’t forget to check for updates for the apps that don’t automatically update with your operating system.

3. Clear out old emails and other clutter

This task is almost mindless, so I prefer to park myself in front of my latest binge program and go to town with the delete button.

If you have gmail, use the three folders for quick mass deletes. At the top of the menu you will see the labels Primary, Social and Promotions. Simply select all in each tab and hit delete. Poof! Naturally the Primary tab possesses the most time-consuming challenge. File those that need archiving, but be ruthless! Envision how calm you will feel when you pull up your email and have an empty or sparsely populated inbox.

If you don’t have gmail, I find sorting by from or subject to easily group emails no longer relevant, making them prime suspects for the trash can.

Time permitting, delete the following unused items on your devices: apps, text messages, photos, contacts (somehow I have several duplicates), music, etc. No more sorting through unnecessary files and lists to find what you need when you’re done with this task. Also, declutter your desktop images and files; they can impede performance.

4. Change and Protect Your Passwords

Change your passwords and make them strong. Speaking of passwords, where do you keep your running list? I hope you don’t have the same password for all of your sites. If so, that’s like hiding your house key under the front doormat.

123456 is the most common password

LDB and I debate the merits of keeping the credentials list on a Note in the cloud or using one of the password apps (Lisa recommends 1Password). Those tactics are handy yet hackable because they are still out there. We’ve considered reverting to the old-fangled method of a hard copy written list (not hackable, but not always handy). Regardless of which method you use, at the bare minimum change those passwords.

5. Empty the Trash and Clean your Devices

If you make it this far, these last two items are quickies.

Empty the Trash

Free up space on your desktop or laptop by emptying the trash. To do that in the Mac world, look for your Trash icon on the deck, as shown below. On the PC look for the Recycle Bin.

Next, highlight the files to be deleted and click Empty in the upper right corner.

Don’t worry, if you fear you didn’t proof the list well, you get a Are you sure? prompt.

Clean Your Devices

We wash our hands, but how often do we clean our keyboards and screens? Gosh knows the germs that lurk on them. The last step of your Digital Cleanse is to physically clean your devises properly. This link from Apple addresses the best tools and methods to de-funk your digital friends. The tips seem like they could apply to most other non-Apple technology.

I’ve scheduled my cleanse for Friday this week. I’ll tee up my favorite music and try to remain focused on my reward:

The week between Christmas and New Year’s Eve provides the perfect opportunity to reflect on the past 12 months. As we do so, our thoughts first turn to the the brave and lovely ladies who welcomed us into their homes and businesses in 2015. Sharing their creativity with our posse inspired our own lives, and we are so grateful that they allowed us to help inspired yours.

In case you missed any of them, let’s take a couple of moments to head down memory lane courtesy of the Waterlogue and Brushstroke apps, as we say thank you.

Just looking back on each of these posts, we are awed and inspired all over again. Thank you so very much for sharing your creativity with The Gracious Posse.

And to all of our Gracious Posse readers, thank you for all of your comments over this past year. Whether in the comments section below, in emails or texts or when we run into you at the grocery store, your words make our day! We look forward to bringing your more posts in 2016 that celebrate inspired living with practical style. If you know anyone who fits that bill, please let us know as we would love to feature them here on The Gracious Posse!

Welcome to Organization Week. First up, as requested by a Gracious Posse follower, is organizing digital photos.

One of the perks of this job is getting to know experts who can make our lives easier. In this case, I have known and admired Lisa Burlee since our Junior League days, dating back to 1994, when we set up a computer lab out of old donated computer parts at the Sacred Heart Center. From a middle school teacher before she and her husband started their family, Lisa slowly built her technology career over the years she was raising her three sons. She began by teaching six hours a week at a local computer lab and then set up a workshop of classes. Now as an empty-nester, she runs her own thriving technology consulting business for home and small businesses. RVA has countless happy technology consumers thanks to Lisa’s expertise, patience and good humor.

When I wrote Time for a Fresh Start, I knew I would turn to Lisa for expert advice in organizing my digital photos. This post addresses photos in digital format only. Look to this Friday’s post for advice on organizing your hard copy photos to prepare them for their digital life. (Note: I will be referencing and demonstrating with the Apple iMac and the most current version of iPhoto software.)

READY?

Step 1 — Decide What Event-naming Convention Works for You

My digital photos have had no organization methodology whatsoever.

note the plethora of diverse names for my events

Until our session with Lisa, I had no appreciation of the impact that years of importing photos, synchronizing devices and Photo Stream without naming Events consistently has had on my iPhoto library. All I knew was that it was very time-consuming to locate photos I needed to use.

I am going to adopt Lisa’s naming format going forward: by year, then event, such as 2014 Christmas. All of your photos from 2014 will group together in your library, for example, if you use this method. You could name your events after children or vacations, but for Lisa and me, using a year first makes the most sense.

Step 2 — Name your Events Using Your New Naming Convention

It is imperative to understand that your digital photos live in one place: Events. If you don’t organize and name your events when you import photos to your library, iPhoto will do it for you, with the descriptive

Unnamed Event

to describe the group of pictures it holds. Try to find the photo of your precious Muffy at the dance recital in 4th grade with a multitude of Unnamed Events. Better pour a cup of something to keep you company while you scroll through your thousands of photos.

Tip #1: Organize by Event, using a consistent naming convention that makes sense to you.

A word about Albums in iPhoto: photos don’t reside there. They just point to the events holding the photos. Your photos live only one place in iPhoto – in Events. For instance, if you are going to collect photos of a child for his high school yearbook senior ad, name an album something like John’s Raps and Taps, then add photos to that album as you scroll through your events. You’ll have those photos at your fingertips in the album when you are ready to use them.

Lisa has always told me to organize by event as a precaution. If you wish to use a different photo application other than iPhoto down the road (or you switch entirely to a PC), your events will move, but the albums will not. You could lose your filing method if you file by album. (Although there is a work-around for moving albums, I’ll let Lisa sort that out with you if you need it).

Tip #2: Use Albums to organize photos for projects, not permanent organization.

Step 3 — Rename and/or Move Photos to Events

Begin by importing photos still residing on cameras, phones or tablets. If you are an iPhone or iPad user and you have turned on Photo Stream, all of your photos should be in your current photo stream or previous months’ streams. You may want to import and delete them just to free-up storage on those devices.

Rename Events

One of the few events descriptively named in my library contains photos from my choir trip to Italy, but they are named by city only. The easiest organizational change to make here is to simply rename the event, in this case 2013 Choir Trip Rome.

How to Create a New Event out of an Existing Event

You probably have oodles of untitled events with photos taken on the same day; perhaps they are from one event, but possibly not. In that case, you should subdivide that untitled event, creating a new event(s) from the related pictures. Here’s how.

Δ Choose an event to begin organizing your photos.

I chose this unnamed event because it was filled mostly with photos from our review of the Lewis Ginter Splendor Under Glass Gala.

Δ Select photos by clicking on them from that event that you want to choose to file in a new event.

selected photos have yellow border

Δ Choose Create Event from Events Menu.

Δ Find the newuntitled event (pink arrow) that was created with selected pictures and change the name to your new filing system name (click on the words untitled event to change).

The green arrow in photo below points to the two unselected photos left from the original event. You then can either rename that untitled event or move the pictures to other named Events.

In this case, I’m going to rename that event 2014November and begin moving photos taken in November to it that are not related to a specific event. As I go, I will delete unwanted ones. In the photo below I’ve clicked on four photos above it and dragged them into the 2014 November event.

Continue subdividing, renaming, moving and deleting until you are satisfied with your organized library.

Note to Photo Stream Users: Photo Stream automatically creates an event out of each month’s Photo Stream, so for photos taken on your iPad or iPhone, you don’t need to import them. They already reside in your monthly Photo Stream event and are ready for you to subdivide to other events if you want to do so.

In the example above, December 2014 Photo Stream is an event that lives on my Mac, not in iCloud. The active Photo Stream still holds the rolling current 1000 photos.

Wow, Now What? Can I Do This?

Yes! Just start small. Remember, the naming convention and organizing by events are the MOST IMPORTANT keys to your success. Take one event at a time.

With the volume of digital photos probably residing on your computer and other devices, you may choose to NOT organize old photos. That’s okay, too. Just begin with new photos using the new naming convention. Remember, organizing has to work for you.

For our readers living outside of RVA, Lisa does remote support sessions. Alison and I have both had remote sessions with her, and we can attest that it works! In any event, be sure to sign-up for Lisa’s helpful newsletters (just send her an email request to be added to the list). She is well-versed in both the PC/Microsoft and Apple worlds and addresses both environments.

Alison and I appreciate the time Lisa spent with us. Keeping up with the ever-changing digital world is challenging, especially when we have other demands on our time. Thank heavens for Lisa Burlee, the technology expert amongst us.

January 19, 2014

p.s. You only have two more days to enter our Dana Gibson Emperor pillow giveaway. If you think you did enter, please make sure that you completed your entries on Rafflecopter. The photo graphic will tell you how many entries out of a possible 8 have been recorded on your behalf with Rafflecopter.

Sometimes you have to click more than once when you return to the graphic for your entry to be recorded.

Full disclaimer: This post contains practical material. We are covering this topic as a public service to our loyal readers. Expect no flowers, cakes or cool ideas for your interior decor. You will, however, be glad that you read it.

Several years ago a friend’s vacation home burned to the ground. I’ll never forget her admonition to us when discussing the rebuilding process: “Document your home inventory!” With her words ringing in my ears, I took my film camera and photographed our valuables. Those few photos reside in our safe but, several years later, represent a fraction of what we stand to lose through loss or theft. Indeed many of the photos were of items now residing in a landfill somewhere.

(remember these?)

With the advances in technology since the mid-90’s, it is easier than ever to protect your gracious home’s belongings. Why not try one of these three methods.

1. Fast and Easy – Take Pictures

1. Take pictures of your valuables.2. Develop or print pictures.3. Label the back of the photo with item, date acquired, age and approximate value.4. Store in a fire-proof safe or in a safe deposit box at a bank.

2. Build a Spreadsheet

Lisa Burlee, my technology heroine and friend, recommends using a spreadsheet to log your home inventory. She gives excellent instructions on how to add a photo of your item to your spreadsheet. Click here to get her instructions.

1. Take digital photos of your items.2. Download this template for your spreadsheet. (After clicking on “template” you will be taken to the www.scribd.com website. The screen displays an image of our spreadsheet. Click the “download” button, and the spread sheet template will download to your computer. When you open the file, it becomes a live spreadsheet. Just delete the examples.)3. Follow Lisa’s directions to add the photo of your item into the spreadsheet along with the other item information.4. Back-up your spreadsheet on an external hard drive or in the “cloud.”

3. Use an App!

When I set out to research this subject, I thought certainly there was “an app for that.” Well, there are a few, and the one that I would consider using is called “Home Inventory” from the Apple App Store. Actually, it is two apps in one: the software for your desktop, and the mobile helper for your iphone to enable you to take pictures and add them easily to the inventory on your desktop. For $19.99 it might be worth the investment.

Choices

So, with three different alternatives, what to do? If you just want the quickest route to document your belongings, go with the Fast and Easy method. If you are comfortable with Excel and digital photography, why re-invent the wheel and pay up for the Apple app? If you want to pay for a turn-key comprehensive solution for documenting your belongings with photos and you have a Mac, then go with the “Home Inventory” app. Don’t let the decision bog you down, though; the most important thing is to protect your gracious home.

8 months agoby thegraciousposseCelebrate Flag Day today! Seeing the Stars and Stripes flying over Utah Beach in Normandy along side the French Flag fills me with a spirit of thankfulness for our great nation. #starsandstripes#utahbeach